


And So The Ashes Fall Like Snow

by DazzleYourMindsEye



Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, RWBY Volume 8, RWBY Volume 8 Chapter 8 Spoilers, RWBY spoilers, The whale explodes and they think Yang is dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 10:15:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29276790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DazzleYourMindsEye/pseuds/DazzleYourMindsEye
Summary: A world without Yang didn’t make sense. Yang was a constant in her life, from her earliest memory. Always there with a joke, or a hug, or a funny bedtime story after a bad dream. Ruby felt frozen, stalled on the tracks facing down an oncoming train. Yang couldn’t be gone, she just couldn’t…
Relationships: Blake Belladonna/Yang Xiao Long
Comments: 3
Kudos: 163





	And So The Ashes Fall Like Snow

**Author's Note:**

> Heey all! I'm not dead! (The GoT AU is coming along slowly lol it is a tough one) So here's a short angsty fic in the interim written after a discord conversation with a friend of mine. They wrote their own take on it as well, so go check it out here! https://archiveofourown.org/works/29270664

“What do you mean _they were still in there?!”_

Ruby barely registered Weiss’s shrill voice in the back of her mind. The flaming carcass of the enormous Grimm was all she could see. Orange and red flames licked the sky, taller than any building on Atlas, stretching like hungry fingers to the stars.

It felt like her mind had slowed down, mired in muck hip deep. Winter’s words seemed to register slowly, one word at a time, her mind was rejecting them as the came, carefully inspecting each for the smallest sign of deception. Yang? Jaune and Ren? _Gone?_

A world without Yang didn’t make sense. Yang was a constant in her life, from her earliest memory. Always there with a joke, or a hug, or a funny bedtime story after a bad dream. Ruby felt frozen, stalled on the tracks facing down an oncoming train. Yang couldn’t be gone, she just couldn’t…

“So you didn’t see anything? Anything at all? No movement or – BLAKE NO!”

A pale blur to the right and Weiss’s sudden shriek jolted Ruby like an electric shock. Reality snapped back into place like an overstretched rubber band and she moved without thinking, tackling Blake as she sprinted by, towards the flaming carcass in the distance.

Blake thrashed _hard_ against Ruby’s arms. Blake wasn’t a weak woman and Ruby ground her heels into the dirt, gritting her teeth.

A sharp elbow drove into her gut and she wheezed.

“Blake – _grunt_ – you need to stop -”

Blake yanked an arm free and stretched it out towards the flames. A single sound wrenched from her throat, a sound that might have been a name. An anguished sound, filled with a pain that couldn’t be described in words.

Ruby sucked in a sharp breath, eyes burning as hot tears rolled down her cheeks. “Blake, please… I can’t lose another sister.”

Blake froze. Ruby felt her shudder, then slump over. Both girls sunk to the ground, ignoring the damp dirt below their knees. Blake’s torso heaved with wrenching sobs, and Ruby squeezed her tighter, pressing her tears into the back of Blake’s shoulder.

Ruby felt a cool presence at her side, and suddenly Weiss was there, leaning on them both. Tears glistened on her pale cheeks.

It felt like hours they sat, watching the flames and not being able to bear looking at them at the same time.

When a shout echoed from behind them. “Look!”

Ruby lifted her face from Blake’s damp shoulder to peer at the fire again.

There.

Movement. People? The edges slowly growing more defined. Jaune’s broad shoulders and Ren’s more slender torso. And there, in the front with a stumbling Oscar clinging to her side was -

“YANG!” Weiss shouted it first but it was Blake who wrenched away from Ruby to stagger to her feet. And this time Ruby let her.

Blake stumbled at first, then into a sprint. Yang stopped, eyes widening before Blake reached her and threw her arms around her neck, heedless of Oscar’s arm slung over Yang’s shoulders.

Jaune stepped forward to gently pull Oscar out of the way. Ruby felt a lance of worry at Oscar’s swollen face and obvious injuries, but he smiled softly at her and nodded, which made her breathe a sigh of relief.

With her arms free Yang wrapped them around Blake’s shaking form and mirrored her pose, pressing her face into Blake’s neck.

Ruby got to her feet slowly, feeling all the world like she was witnessing a moment she shouldn’t be. She started a bit when a soft and cool hand slipped into hers, then looked up to meet Weiss’s face. Weiss cleared her throat and gave an obvious tilt of her head in Yang’s direction. Ruby widened her eyes, silently communicating with her partner _what, now?_ In response Weiss rolled her eyes and shoved her shoulder.

When Ruby turned back to Yang, her sister was watching her from over Blake’s head. Some unknown expression twisted Yang’s mouth and Ruby spotted the suspicious way her eyes glistened. Yang said nothing, but held out one hand in a silent invitation.

Ruby felt the lump in her throat swell to choke her, and the sob that came out was a little strangled. A blur of rose petals, and she was clinging just as tightly to her sister as Blake.


End file.
